## Facts

- Benita Williams, a prisoner, alleged that after her prison sentence ended she was still confined at a halfway house in Youngstown, Ohio, operated by Community Corrections Association (CCA).
- Williams claimed she was not permitted to leave the halfway house and was restricted from handling basic personal and legal tasks, such as accessing money, running her business, and using a library for legal research.
- She filed a pro se civil-rights action in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against (1) Baldolf (a warden), (2) CCA, and (3) the Director of the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction.
- Although the alleged confinement occurred in Youngstown (within the Northern District of Ohio), two of the three defendants resided in the Southern District of Ohio.
- Williams also had another case pending in the Southern District of Ohio.
- Without giving either side notice or an opportunity to present arguments, a magistrate judge in the Southern District of Ohio transferred the case to the Northern District of Ohio under 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a).
- The transfer order stated that the case could have been brought in the Northern District because the halfway house was located there, but it did not discuss convenience factors, public factors, or Williams’s choice of forum.
- After the case was docketed in the Northern District of Ohio, the assigned district judge reviewed whether the sua sponte transfer complied with the procedural requirements for transfers under § 1404(a).

## Issues

1. May a federal court transfer a case sua sponte under 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a) without first giving the parties an opportunity to be heard on whether transfer is appropriate?
2. If a case is transferred without that opportunity, should the transferee court return the case to the transferor court?

## Decision

- The court held that the parties were entitled to be heard on the question of transfer under § 1404(a) before any sua sponte transfer was ordered.
- Because the Southern District transferred the case without providing that opportunity, the Northern District concluded the transfer was improper.
- The court directed the Clerk of Court to transfer the action back to the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, Eastern Division, for further proceedings.
- The court did not decide the merits of Williams’s § 1983 claims; it addressed only the validity of the transfer procedure.

## Legal Principles

- A discretionary transfer under 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a) requires procedural fairness: parties must have notice and a chance to be heard before a court orders transfer on its own initiative.
- While a court may raise the possibility of transfer under § 1404(a) on its own, it must still allow input from the parties before ordering the transfer.
- A § 1404(a) transfer decision calls for consideration of the statutory purposes—convenience and the interest of justice—and ordinarily should account for factors such as party and witness convenience and the plaintiff’s chosen forum.
- When a case has been transferred without the required opportunity for party input, the transferee court may remedy the defect by returning the case to the district where it was filed.

## Conclusion

Williams v. Baldolf addresses procedure, not the merits of a prisoner’s unlawful-confinement allegations: the Northern District of Ohio ordered the case returned to the Southern District of Ohio because the original court transferred the action sua sponte under § 1404(a) without first giving the parties an opportunity to be heard on whether transfer was warranted.


Williams v. Baldolf, 2021 WL 252579 (2021)